A NOVELIST AND AN URBAN COWBOY SLUG IT OUT IN NEW ORLEANS IN FULL-PAGE ADS

It all began when best-selling vampire novelist Anne Rice took out a full-page ad in the New Orleans Times-Picayune going for the neck of a fellow celebrity for opening an "absolutely hideous" restaurant on one of her hometown's most famous avenues.

Al Copeland, whose peach-colored Straya restaurant, complete with palm trees and enough neon to guide air traffic, brings a splash of Las Vegas and Miami Beach to a decaying stretch of New Orleans' elegant St. Charles Avenue, bit back 48 hours later with a two-page ad of his own. Copeland, who favors ostrich-skin cowboy boots and is known across Louisiana...